“Maybe Napoleon was wrong when he said we were a nation of shopkeepers... Today England looked like a nation of goalkeepers.” SaidTodayNationsEnglandGoalkeepersShopkeepers Author:Tom Stoppard
“Dwellers by the sea cannot fail to be impressed by the sight of its ceaseless ebb and flow, and are apt, on the principles of that rude philosophy of sympathy and resemblance... to trace a subtle relation, a secret harmony, between its tides and the life of man... The belief that most deaths happen at ebb tide is said to be held along the east coast of England from Northumberland to Kent.” MenSaidPhilosophyHappensBeliefSecretPrinciplesFailingSeaFlowSightEnglandRelationHarmonyEastSubtleTidesImpressedRudeCoastResemblanceEast CoastEbb And FlowDwellersKent Author:James G. Frazer
“From that point on, the extraordinary system of spies and informers which has played an important part in the political work of the French state into our own time took shape. (Sartine, who became lieutenant general de police in 1759, is supposed to have said to Louis XV, "Sire, when three people are chatting in the street one of them is surely my man.") Eighteenth-century police manuals like those of Colquhoun in England or Lemaire in France are no less than general treatises on the government's full repertoire of domestic regulation, coercion, and surveillance.” PeopleMenSaidImportantStatesGovernmentPoliticalThreeStreetsCenturyShapesEnglandPoliceExtraordinaryFrancePrivacyRegulationSpyCoercionSurveillanceManualsLieutenantsChattingInformers Book:The Formation of national States in Western Europe Source: The Formation of national States in Western Europe
“Medieval England was a great military power with a sophisticated machinery of government, but her naval administration, at best improvised and for long periods missing altogether, pointed to a grave weakness: the lack of any reliable means of putting a force of warships at the disposal of the crown. Only Richard I and Henry V of all the kings of England can be said to have understood the problem and attempted to remedy it. It is no coincidence that they wer by far the most successful in war.” MeanLongSaidWarProblemGovernmentForceSuccessfulMilitaryMissingKingsPeriodsUnderstoodWeaknessEnglandGravesAdministrationRemedyCrownsSophisticatedCoincidenceMachineryMedievalNavalMilitary PowerGreat MilitaryHenry VWarships Author:Nicholas Rodger